Smart Village Dhanora

Introduction

Dhanora is a small village of Rajasthan which is 30 km away from Dhaulpur district headquarters and is 248 km away from Jaipur City. The population of the village is around 2000. The village was devoid of its basic needs like sanitation, internal roads. It was also facing various other similar problems such as lack of access to potable water, non-availability of water conservation system, encroachment on the roads, power fluctuation, non-availability of employment oriented education, unemployment and poverty, so on and so forth. In spite of all these obstacles, a person was dreaming since his childhood to do something good and constructive for the society and for his small village which was devoid of most of the basic amenities. His determination and quest of doing something for the society has given him a marvellous success. The person which is being referred to is Dr, Satyapal Singh Meena, an officer of the Indian Revenue Service. His thirst of doing some social work was whirling around and stretching him towards his goal of doing good to the village and its villagers.

During his tenure of service, when he got posted to Aurangabad Maharashtra, Eco Needs Foundation, a non government organisation invited him in Eco Revolution 2010 Conference as a guest. He has got an opportunity to interact with Prof. Priyanand Agale, the founder president of Eco Needs Foundation. The Foundation is into the activities of development of rural areas and small hamlets by adopting them and fostering them. Dr. Satyapal Singh was very much impressed by the foundations work and he appealed the foundation to work for development of his village also. Prof. Agale visited the Village Dhanora and tried to understand the problems and their solutions. Prof. Agale was already working on the concept of the smart village which was based on a structured development of the village. The concept was developed by Prof. Agale, Dr. Parag Sadgir and Adv. Attdeep Agale. As per the views of Prof. Agale, villages are undeveloped because of being unplanned and also due to lack of systematic development. The concept of Smart Village has been evolved by the Foundation, wherein the focus is given to all-round human development and also to arresting rapid deterioration of natural resources. The concept emphasizes sustainable development by providing basic amenities like sanitation, safe drinking water, internal road, tree plantation, water conservation, and basic means of livelihood etc. The Foundation also works for inculcating moral values in the society and for improving the standard of living of the villagers. According to Prof. Agale, the development of village shall be based on five paths, namely, Retrofitting, Redevelopment, Greenfield, e-Pan and Livelihood. On the same line, the meeting of all stakeholders (villagers, Gram Panchayat etc.) was organized, surprisingly there was an overwhelmed response for the meeting. Considering the enthusiasm and aspirations of villagers, Dhanora was adopted to develop as Smart Village. For the same Sustainable and inclusive development, the concept of the smart village criteria was kept as main goal. It is the cumulative effort of the district administration, Eco Need Foundation (NGO) and the active public participation.

Smart Village the Social Outcomes at Dhanora

Better Equanimity and brotherhood has resulted in recognition the village as “Crime Free Village” by the District Police as no FIR is pending with the police station.

Village is transforming to Alcohol free village.

Open Defecation free village.

Smart village concept adopted by Rajasthan Government for the state.

Village awarded by Government of Rajasthan for its development.

Nearby 100 Villages inspired from smart village Dhanora and becomes the part of “Soch Badlo Goan Badlo” movement for rural reform in India.

Eco-Needs Foundation (ENF) is an organization of young people striving for environmental conservation and ECO-REVOLUTION.

It is a revolution entailing all round ecological development.
which includes economic, social, educational, cultural, health, technological development and conservation of water and other natural resources, and above all the holistic development of the ecology.